All Roads, the final book in the Life & Times trilogy,
goes out into the word today. I wish it
all the best as I am rather fond of that book. In fact I liked writing the
whole trilogy, but I might be a bit biased. It’s not unlike having children,
you know, and I have some of those too. You want to be protective and all that,
but you just got to sit back and let it find its own way.
I remember when it was nothing more than a few notes and
scraps of character. In fact the trilogy came about because I started three
different versions of what I thought was the same story. 100 pages into each,
it dawned on me and Born & Bred, Wandering in Exile, and All Roads were the
result.
It is not—and I repeat not—autobiographical even though much
that happens in the books did happen, but not to me. I just happened to be
nearby when it did.
The responses so far have been mixed, to say the least, and
that is not a bad thing. The story of Danny and the rest of them; Deirdre, the
kids, Jacinta & Jerry, Miriam, Patrick and the rest are the stories of
people I have watched cope with the ever changing times I have lived
through.
The past plays a role as it does in real life and today,
just like every other day, the past is the backdrop and we struggle to be free
of it.
Since writing the story, I have moved and am slowly settling
into a very different reality but I look back at the 4 years I spent in my
writing chair with a mix of pride and nostalgia. There are new and different
books waiting to be written but today I’ll take a moment to sit back and
acknowledge Danny Boyle for all that he taught me.
